Noon came and went. The storm hit at half past 12:00 with the particular violence of something that has been organizing itself all morning. The wind came first, hard enough to rattle the windows in their frames, and then the rain, which was not gentle, and then the thunder, which was right on top of the lightning in the way that meant the center of it was directly overhead. Clara sat in the main room with all four children and listened to the storm and said nothing about Thomas. Noah was on her lap.
He had climbed there 20 minutes into the storm without asking, and she had put her arm around him without thinking about it, and that was where they stayed. Emma sat beside her with her shoulder touching Clara's arm. Luke was at the window narrating. Jacob sat across the room with his arms on his knees watching the door. An hour passed.
An hour and a half. Jacob stood up. "He should be back," he said. "The storm is bad," Clara said. "He may have taken shelter."
"Where?" "There's nothing out on the south line." She knew that. She had not been going to say that. "Papa knows this land," Emma said.
She was saying it to herself as much as anyone. "He knows it better than anyone. The creek floods in storms like this," Jacob said. He was not saying it to be frightening. He was saying it because it was true, and he needed to say true things out loud.
"If he was near the creek Jacob," Clara said. He stopped. She met his eyes. He was 10 years old, and he was terrified, and he was trying very hard to be something larger than 10, and she could see both things in his face simultaneously and clearly. "Sit down."
She said, not harshly. "Sit down and stay here with your family." A beat of silence. He sat. Noah turned his face into Clara's shoulder.
She held him tighter. The storm ran another 40 minutes before it began to pull back. And in that 40 minutes, not one of the children made a sound that required her attention, which was its own testament to who they were and what they had already learned to endure. When the rain slowed to something manageable, Clara looked at Jacob. He was already looking at her.
"Stay here." She said. "You're not going out." He said. "Stay here with your brothers and sister."
She said. "I mean it, Jacob." She got her coat. She found him halfway between the south fence and the barn. He was on his feet, which was the first thing, and she felt the hard knot in her chest loosen one single degree at the sight of it.